Activity concentrations and population dose from radium-226 in food and drinking water in Taiwan

The purpose of this study was to determine the radioactivity of 226Ra in environmental samples in Taiwan. Fish, pork, rice, flour, chicken, vegetable, milk, fruit, egg and water samples were collected and pretreated by radiochemical procedure to extract the 226Ra, and the activity concentrations of 226Ra were determined using a liquid scintillation counter. The 226Ra content of groundwater was 12.0 mBq l-1. The 226Ra contents of the food ranged from 0.02 Bq kg-1 fresh to 0.17 Bq kg-1 fresh. The annual internal dose from ingestion of 226Ra from food and drinking water per caput was evaluated to be 7.5 microSv.